Bin Laden Strikes Out

Osama
bin Laden's latest video was broadcast on al-Jazeera on Monday, in which
he commanded Muslims to boycott the Jan. 30 elections in Iraq and expressed
his approval of Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Zarqawi had been a
rival of bin Laden's in Afghanistan, and had earlier declined to share resources
with al-Qaeda. But in recent months, al-Zarqawi changed the name of his group
from Monotheism and Holy war to Mesopotamian al-Qaeda and pledged fealty to
bin Laden.

In declaring "infidels" all who vote under the "infidel" interim constitution
negotiated by Iraqi politicians with U.S. civil administrator Paul Bremer last
winter, bin Laden is seeking to counter the decree of grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani
that Iraqis must vote in the upcoming elections or they will be consigned to
hell. Bin Laden is arguing, according to the Aljazeera.net in Arabic, that the
interim constitution that is the framework for elections is artificial and pagan
("jahili," pertaining to the Age of Ignorance before Islam) because it
does not recognize Islam as the sole source of law.

Bin Laden's intervention in Iraq was ham-fisted and clumsy, and will benefit
the United States and the Shi'ites enormously. Most Iraqi Muslims, Sunni or
Shi'ite, dislike the Wahhabi branch of Islam prevalent in Saudi Arabia, with
which bin Laden is associated. Nationalistic Iraqis will object to a foreigner
interfering in their national affairs.

Zarqawi is widely hated in Iraq because the operations of his group often kill
innocent Iraqis as opposed to American troops. The Shi'ites in particular despise
Zarqawi and are aware of his hopes of provoking a Sunni-Shi'ite bloodbath in
Iraq. (The muted Shi'ite response to the U.S. assault on Fallujah in November
and December derived in large part from a conviction that the city had become
a base for Zarqawi and like-minded Salafi terrorists). Zarqawi Web sites have
claimed credit for the assassination in 2003 of Ayatollah Muhammad Baqir al-Hakim,
a respected Shi'ite leader, which involved descrating the Shi'ite holy city
of Najaf. The mainstream of the Kurds hates Zarqawi because of his earlier association
with the small Kurdish radical Muslim terrorist group, Ansar al-Islam, which
targeted the two major Kurdish parties.

Bin Laden as much as declared Grand Ayatollah Sistani an infidel. But Sistani
is almost universally loved by the 65% of Iraqis who are Shi'ites, and is widely
respected among many Sunni Arabs, Kurds, and Turkmen, as well. Bin Laden, the
Saudi engineer, makes himself look ridiculous trying to give a fatwa against
the Grand Ayatollah of Najaf. If anything, to have al-Qaeda menacing the Shi'ites
in this way would tend to strengthen the American-Shi'ite alliance.

If bin Laden had been politically clever, he would have phrased his message
in terms of Iraqi nationalism. By siding with the narrowest sliver of Sunni
extremists, he denied himself any real impact. By adopting Zarqawi, who has
killed many more Iraqis (especially Shi'ites) than he has Americans, he simply
tarnishes his own image inside Iraq.

It appears that bin Laden is so weak now that he is forced to play to his own
base of Saudi and Salafi jihadists, some of whom are volunteer guerrillas in
Iraq. They are the only ones in Iraq who would be happy to see this particular
videotape.

The only way bin Laden could profit from this intervention in the least would
be if a civil war between Sunni Arabs and Shi'ites really did break out in Iraq,
and if the beleaguered Sunnis went over to al-Qaeda in large numbers. Since
the Sunni Arabs are a minority of 20%, they and he would still lose, but for
bin Laden, who is now a refugee and without any strong political base outside
a few provinces of Saudi Arabia, to pick up 5 million Iraqi Sunni Arabs would
be a major political victory. His recent videotape calling for the overthrow
of the Saudi government suggests that he might hope to use any increased popularity
in Anbar province as a springboard for renewed attacks on Saudi Arabia, especially
on its petroleum sector.

It is a desperate, crackpot hope. The narrow, sectarian, and politically unskillful
character of this speech is the most hopeful sign I have seen in some time that
al-Qaeda is a doomed political force, a mere Baader-Meinhof
Gang or Red Army Faction with greater geographical reach.